Gary King visits Alamogordo while on the campaign trail

Peter Dindinger--Daily News
Democrat Gary King talks about the issues of his gubernatorial campaign while his wife, Yolanda, listens. King is running against incumbent Gov. Susana Martinez in the November election.

New Mexico Attorney General and gubernatorial candidate Gary King was in Alamogordo for a campaign function, a visit with voters and a ride in the Otero County Fair and Rodeo parade Saturday.

King was also in town because his office, in conjunction with Sierra Pacific Mortgage, hosted a home buying seminar Saturday at the Alamogordo Public Library. King was in attendance for the workshop to inform residents about the legal aspects of home buying.

Democrat King is running for governor against Republican incumbent Gov. Susana Martinez in the November general election.

An independent statewide Rasmussen telephone survey has King and Martinez tied at 43 percent with 7 percent of the surveyed undecided and 7 percent looking at other candidates.

King said he feels competitive after the release of the poll that was conducted between July 21 and July 22.

"I feel competitive," he said. "My goal was to pull even by Labor Day. There's a couple of polls that show us neck and neck. To me that's a good sign. It does mean that I am a lot more competitive than a lot of people thought I was going to be."

King is in his second term as New Mexico's attorney general. He was first elected to the position in 2006. He represented District 50 in the state House of Representatives between 1987 and 1998. Prior to being a legislator, he graduated from the University of New Mexico with a bachelor's degree in chemistry. King obtained a doctorate degree in organic chemistry from University of Colorado Boulder before receiving his law degree from the UNM Law School.

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King has been in private practice and worked for an environmental consulting firm. He has been married to Yolanda Jones King since 1987. Gary King is the son of former Gov. Bruce King.

He said he and his wife Yolanda have been traveling around the state campaigning.

"Yolanda and I have been campaigning for a long time together," King said. "She was a volunteer on my dad's 1978 gubernatorial campaign. We enjoy traveling around the state. It's nice to be in Alamogordo for the day."

He said he believes there are three things that cause him to believe New Mexicans need a change in the governor's office.

"As I travel around the state, what's on people's minds is the damage being done to our education system by the current administration," King said. "I think Gov. Martinez and (Secretary of Education) Hanna Skandera are plunging head-long into this corporatization of New Mexico schools. I am very concerned about the advent of high-stakes standardized testing, for which teacher evaluations are based on how well students are doing on standardized exams."

He said he believes one of the problems of standardized exams are no one clearly understands whether or not the exams properly evaluate a student's learning ability.

"We're giving it to first graders," King said. "It's all computerized. It's not clear if all the schools have the equipment to administer the exam properly. It's not clear if first graders can type well enough to take an exam on a computer. I've also had teachers tell me they're spending 80 days out of a 180-day school year preparing for or administering standardized tests. It reduces our school year to 120 days instead of 180 days of educational experience. We should be doing more instead of less educational experience with our kids."

He said he is concerned about New Mexico's ranking in child welfare.

"New Mexico was ranked 50th, but the Casey Foundation said now we've moved up to 49th," King said. "I tell people it's not that we're doing better but Mississippi is doing worse. We have failed miserably in addressing the needs of children. It's a very close issue in my family. I very much want to be the governor to improve how we treat children in New Mexico."

He also said he is concerned with the poor economy in the state.

"We are one of only two states that lost jobs in the last year-and-a-half," King said. "I am not seeing any real action from the current administration to address it."